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arXiv 0906.0458astro-ph.COastro-ph.GA
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原始晕中恒星形成的开始

The onset of star formation in primordial haloes

Umberto Maio, Benedetta Ciardi, Naoki Yoshida, Klaus Dolag, Luca Tornatore

摘要:

恒星的形成一直是天体物理学中未解决的问题。大尺度结构模拟的数值研究不能解决整个过程,他们的方法通常假设只有密度超过典型阈值的气体才能容纳和形成恒星。我们调查宇宙学恒星形成的发病和比较几个非常高的分辨率,三维,N体/SPH模拟,包括非平衡,原子和分子化学,恒星形成处方,和反馈效应。我们研究了原始恒星的形成如何依赖于气体密度阈值,宇宙学参数和初始设置。对于平均密度初始条件,我们发现标准低密度恒星形成阈值(0.2 h^2/cm 3)模型预测恒星形成的开始时间为z~25-31,具体取决于所采用的宇宙学。在这些模型中,恒星的形成与达到临界点和有效逃逸坍缩之间的时间无关。在高红移时,这个时间间隔代表了哈勃时间的一个重要部分,因此这个假设可以诱导大的人为偏移到恒星形成的开始。选择更高的密度阈值(135 h^2/cm 3)可以跟踪整个冷却过程,然后估计恒星形成的开始是在红移z~12-16处。当考虑孤立的、罕见的、高密度的峰值时,化学演化要快得多,第一个恒星形成事件发生在z > 40,几乎与密度阈值的选择无关。这些结果可能对第一个宇宙学物体的形成红移产生影响,这是从平均密度环境的直接数值模拟中推断出来的,也可能对宇宙再电离历史的研究产生影响。

英文摘要:

Star formation remains an unsolved problem in astrophysics. Numerical studies of large-scale structure simulations cannot resolve the whole process and their approach usually assumes that only gas denser than a typical threshold can host and form stars. We investigate the onset of cosmological star formation and compare several very-high-resolution, three-dimensional, N-body/SPH simulations that include non-equilibrium, atomic and molecular chemistry, star formation prescriptions, and feedback effects. We study how primordial star formation depends on gas density thresholds, cosmological parameters and initial set-ups. For mean-density initial conditions, we find that standard low-density star-formation threshold (0.2 h^2/cm3) models predict the onset of star formation at z~25-31, depending on the adopted cosmology. In these models stars are formed regardless of the time between the moment when the threshold is reached and the effective runaway collapse. At high redshift, this time interval represents a significant fraction of the Hubble time and thus this assumption can induce large artificial off-sets to the onset of star formation. Choosing higher density thresholds (135 h^2/cm3) allows the entire cooling process to be followed, and the onset of star formation is then estimated to be at redshift z~12-16. When isolated, rare, high-density peaks are considered, the chemical evolution is much faster and the first star formation episodes occur at z > 40, almost regardless of the choice for the density threshold. These results could have implications for the formation redshift of the first cosmological objects, as inferred from direct numerical simulations of mean-density environments, and on the studies of the reionization history of the universe.

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